Global Warming - Potential Problems and Possible Solutions
By Dr. Bimal K. Bose, D.Sc., LFIEEE
Emeritus Chair Professor of Electrical Engineering
Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
The University of Tennessee
Knoxville, TN 37996-2100
Tel: (865)974-8398, Fax: (865)974-5483
E-mail-bbose@utk.edu
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bimal_Kumar_Bose
Global warming due to man-made greenhouse gases appears to be a serious potential problem in our society. In 2007, Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to United Nations-IPCC (Inter-Governmental Panel of Climate Change) along with the U.S. Ex-Vice-President Al. Gore for their contributions in global warming. The root of this problem is the growth of astronomical energy consumption in the world. Energy has been the life-blood of our civilization, and per capita energy consumption has been the barometer of a nation’s prosperity. In the olden days of pre-industrial revolution era, as indicated in Fig.1, mankind was mainly dependent on animal and manual labor. In this muscle age, our life style was very simple and unsophisticated, and the environment was clean. In 1785, James Watt of Scottland invented steam engine that ushered in the industrial revolution, and we were brought in the mechanical age, or age of machines. The industrial revolution gained momentum by the invention of internal combustion engine in the late nineteenth century. The wave of industrial revolution gradually spread from Europe to USA, and then to the rest of the world. The electrical revolution, or age of electricity started by the commercial availability of electricity in mid-1880’s, when at the same time, commercial induction motor was invented (1888) by Nickola Tesla. The commercial dc motor was introduced at an earlier date (1873), and then the synchronous motor arrived at slightly later date (1891). The electronics revolution, or the age of modern solid state electronics was ushered by the invention of transistor in 1948 by Bardeen, Brattain and Shockley of U.S. Bell Telephone Lab. The same Bell Lab. also invented thyristor in 1956 that brought us in the age of solid state power electronics. Afterwards, gradually, came the eras of integrated circuits, computers, communication, and robotics. We now live in Internet age that brought revolution in communication. The whole world shrank into a global village. Human society is now more interdependent than ever. During these mechanical, electrical and electronics ages, the energy consumption in the world has been growing by leaps and bounds to cater the need of growing world population and improvement of living standard. So far, we hardly paid any attention to the adverse effect of energy consumption, i.e., environmental pollution problem.
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Global Warming - Potential Problems and Possible Solutions
